Saturday, December 19, 2015

Love, the Gift, is On the Way

Detail from On the Way with the Gift

This is not the typical snowy Belgium* village scene, so reminiscent of the bleak yet quaint mid winter, but take a close look at the dessert carried by the little girl: it looks like a Christmas Pudding to me! Everything about this painting -- the title, the guests bearing gifts, the implied hospitality, the flowers, the swans a - swimming, the custom and ceremony -- brings to mind Eleanor Farjeon's joyful carol:

People, look east. The time is near
Of the crowning of the year.
Make your house fair as you are able,
Trim the hearth and set the table.
People, look east and sing today:
Love, the guest, is on the way
.

~ Eleanor Farjeon ~

~ Sung by Marty Haugen ~

Here is the entire painting as Gerry and I saw it last January (2015)
when we visited the Groeninge Museum in Bruges:
by Emile Rommelaere, 1873 - 1961

And, in keeping with the season . . .

St. Nicholas Altarpiece, 1486-93
Oil on oak panel, 102 x 82 cm
Groeninge Museum, Bruges

Legend of St Lucy Triptych, 1480
Oil on oak panel, 79 x 183 cm
Sint-Jacobskerk, Bruges
Both by the Master of the Legend of Saint Lucy,
active in Bruges between 1480 and 1500

********************
*Also at the Groeninge:
The Meebrug in Bruges Covered With Snow
Flori Van Acker, 1858 - 1940

On the slightly less serious side:
American Tourist Photobombs Fake Medieval Portrait
at the Historium Bruges Museum

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